You can tell she’s pure evil just by looking at her

Ladies and gentlemen, we got him.

The Guardian:

A pub being investigated for an alleged hate crime over the display of racist dolls has closed for business after a boycott by three of its suppliers.

Benice Ryley, co-leaseholder of the White Hart Inn in Grays, Essex, said the pub could not recover from the “stigma” of a raid by Essex police when her collection of golly dolls was confiscated as part of its investigation.

The raid gained national attention after a source close to Suella Braverman suggested the home secretary had reprimanded the force over its action. But Essex police said it had had no contact with Braverman over the incident.

It later confirmed that as part of the investigation it was examining Facebook posts by Ryley’s husband, in which he compared the dolls to lynchings in Mississippi and expressed backing for far-right groups. Chris Ryley’s Facebook account has since been deleted. He is due to be interviewed by police later this month when he returns from Turkey, where the family have a holiday home.

“Oi! You got a loisence for dat Facebook post?”

His wife confirmed the pub was closing on Monday in an interview with the Thurrock Nub News. She revealed that two of its beer suppliers, Heineken and Carlsberg, had refused to allow their products to be served in the pub and Innserve, which maintained the pub’s pumps, was also refusing to serve it.

She said: “Carlsberg [and] Heineken told us to stop selling their product because they don’t want their name associated with the pub because of the stigma. And Innserve who serve our pumps and line cleans, they’re not going to come on site any more.”

Ryley blamed Essex police for acting on a complaint about the dolls when it had chosen not to take action after a similar complaint in 2018. She said: “I’m angry … because if the police left it alone like they left it alone in 2018, we wouldn’t be in this situation now. And we probably would have plodded on with the pub.”

When the Guardian visited the pub last month, Ryley expressed her determination to display replacement golly dolls behind the bar. She also said she and her husband had plans to retire to Turkey. A notice behind the pub blamed the police raid on “snowflake complaints”.

That dramatic music…

The following day Camra, the Campaign for Real Ale, said it was reviewing how it granted the White Hart several awards and a place in its guide which highlighted the pub’s “extensive collection of old-fashioned soft toys”.

The pub was vandalised the next weekend.

Ryley said she was disgusted by Camra’s decision to remove the pub from its guide. She said: “I am gutted [by] what Camra done to us. Many people from Camra have been in here … and they’ve never ever said anything about the collection.”

In her interview, Ryley again denied she was racist and claimed that younger generations did not understand golly dolls. She said: “If people think that golly dolls looks like them, they’re the ones who’s got a problem.”

Yeah, the argument is that they aren’t even intended to represent black people, and that this is a situation like when Wizards of the Coast started saying that orcs in Dungeons & Dragons are a stand in for black people (which no one had thought of before).

Whether or not Golliwogs were designed to represent blacks, they certainly are not mean spirited.

And even if they were – who cares?

Seriously, who the hell cares?

What is the threat of simply allowing people to have freedom?

Put the golliwogs back.

We want the golliwogs, and you’re not our boss.

You’re not God and you’re not our boss.

The Guardian:

The landlady of a pub whose collection of golliwog dolls was confiscated by police has assembled replacements, which she plans to display in defiance of a continuing investigation.

Last week four Essex police officers and a trainee seized all the dolls on show in the White Hart Inn in Grays as part of an investigation into an alleged hate crime.

The ominous music really pumped me up

The dolls divide opinion in Grays. On Tuesday some pub regulars turned up to show support, but others expressed their fury. The pub’s landlady, Benice Ryley, 62, refuses to accept they are racist.

Clutching an armful of the dolls, including three that have been donated by supporters, she said: “I’m going to put them back.”

She added: “I’m getting a notice printed saying ‘We’ve got gollies on display, if you find this offensive please don’t come in’. If they don’t like them they can walk out the door.”

The pub’s CCTV footage showed a man entering the pub on 1 March complaining about the dolls. “The police told me he was the victim of an alleged hate crime,” Ryley said.

The pub also received a complaint about the dolls in 2018. Ryley said: “The police was not interested then. So why are they interested now? And why would they come and seize my dolls.”

Ryley’s husband, Chris, who is the pub’s licensee, is due to be interviewed by police next month when he returns from the couple’s holiday home in Turkey.

“It depends what my husband says in the interview whether we are going to be done or not,” Ryley said.

She added: “It’s a complete waste of police time. When they were here something came through on the police radio and they said sorry we can’t attend that at the moment.”

Ryley said the pub has been sent several replacement dolls from supporters with more on the way. “We’ve had loads and loads of support. When people started complaining in 2018 I was sent more gollies in the post. Three have come in the last few days and there are two more in the post.”

She also denies that the word ‘wog’ is racist. She said: “I won’t use that word because I’ve been told not to. But I don’t find that offensive.”

Pub regular Mel Thompson said: “They’re just harmless toys. I’m not offended by that part of their name. Everyone just calls them gollies, anyway.”

Ryley is wary of media interest in the row. “I don’t mind talking to you, but I won’t go on TV because they’ll set me up to be racist.”

Tony Daly, who manages a nearby charity shop, said the dolls made his “blood boil” and said he was shocked they had been on display in such a diverse area.

He also plans to confront Ryley over the issue. He said: “I find them very offensive and I’ll be going there to peacefully put my point across and to educate her. I grew up in Tottenham in the 70s when we fought against those kind of things. They used to call black people golliwogs. It’s a racist symbol that says slavery to me and the black and white minstrels. It’s so outdated and offensive to black people.”

Ryley denied that she or her husband were racist. “I’m not a racist in any form.” She confirmed that her husband had been photographed in a T-shirt from the far-right group Britain First. She said: “I don’t think Chris is a supporter of Britain First, he was just wearing that shirt because it was convenient at the time.”

It’s a convenient shirt.

You’re the racist.

The cops are niggers and they are the racists and we’ve had enough of these nigger cops and we just want to be left alone.

Get out of our lives, niggers!

We just want to live!

She plans on fighting to the last golliwog